Dr. Donald Low walks through his laboratory in Toronto's Mount Sinai hospital, Tuesday, February 19, 2008. The infectious disease doctor who guided Toronto through the 2003 SARS crisis made an appeal prior to his death for Canada to change the law and legalize assisted suicide.THE CANADIAN PRESS/J.P. Moczulski

TORONTO - Dr. Donald Low, the infectious disease specialist who shepherded Toronto through the 2003 SARS crisis, made a videotaped appeal prior to his death for Canada to legalize assisted suicide and let people die with dignity.

The emotional video was shot eight days before Low's death from a brain tumour last week at age 68.

In the YouTube video produced by the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer and posted Tuesday, Low says he is not in pain but his vision, hearing and strength are waning and he worries what will happen before the end.

Low says he would like the option of choosing when he will die, before the disease renders him incapable of walking, swallowing food or using the bathroom without his family's assistance.

"What the end is going to look like, that's what's bothering me the most," he says in a weakened voice, one eye closed, the other held open by a small bandage.

Low says he's envious of people living in some U.S. states and countries such as Switzerland and the Netherlands, where assisted dying is legal.

"They give you a very simple way out. You drink a cocktail and you fall asleep and you do this in the presence of your family. In countries where it's legal, it's quite easy to do. In countries where it's not legal, it's pretty well impossible.

"In Canada, it's illegal and it will be a long time before we mature to a level where we accept dying with dignity," he says, pointing out that there are people who oppose assisted dying, among them "a lot of clinicians."

Those who oppose legalizing assisted suicide argue against it on several grounds: from a religious belief that only God can take a life; that society has a responsibility to preserve life; that assisted dying is a slippery slope toward euthanasia without consent of people with mental illness, physical handicaps or the elderly; and that it violates the doctors' Hippocratic oath to "first, do no harm."

But in his video, Low pleads with those who are against assisted suicide to rethink their stance.

"I wish they could live in my body for 24 hours and I think they would change that opinion," he says. "I'm just frustrated not to be able to have control of my own life. Not being able to have the decision for myself when enough is enough."

The Canadian Medical Association, which represents 78,000 of the country's doctors, prohibits physicians from participating in assisted suicide.

At the CMA's annual meeting in August, delegates voted against a motion calling on all levels of government to hold public hearings into "medical aid in dying."

The reasons were varied: doctors couldn't agree on what the term means; some view it as a medical act, while others see it as simple euthanasia; and delegates also were uncomfortable in telling provincial governments, which are responsible for health care, what their policies should be.

Even so, Canada's doctors are split on the issue. In 2011, a survey of CMA members found that 38 per cent believe assisted suicide should remain against the law, while 34 per cent said it should be legalized.

Canada's law banning doctor-assisted suicide is currently under review by the courts. The B.C. Supreme Court ruled last year that the law is unconstitutional, but the federal government appealed that decision; a ruling by the B.C. Court of Appeal is expected later this year.

Meanwhile, the Quebec government recently introduced its right-to-die bill 52, which would legalize medically assisted dying in the province.

"I think we are on the cusp of change," said Wanda Morris, executive director of Dying With Dignity Canada, calling Low's posthumous video "very poignant."

She said his desire to control the circumstances of his own death is in keeping with the view of the majority of Canadians: an Angus Reid poll last year found 80 per cent of adults support the idea of assisted dying.

"And as people knew and respected and looked up to Dr. Low, we encourage people to act on his wish, to educate their MP, to join Dying with Dignity and add their voices to ours and try to make his dying wish a reality," Morris said from Vancouver.

Lee Fairclough, a spokeswoman for Canadian Partnership Against Cancer, said Low and his family approached the organization about recording a video, one in an upcoming series that presents different patients' views on issues related to palliative end-of-life care.

"Given the circumstances of his passing, the family wished it to be released and so we thought that it was appropriate that we would share it at this time," she said.

In the video, Low asks: "Why make people suffer for no reason when there's an alternative? I just don't understand it."

He says he hopes for a painless death surrounded by family, falling asleep and not waking up in the morning.

A statement on the video says: "Don did not have the death he had hoped for, but he died in his wife's arms and he was not in pain."

Dr. Donald Low walks through his laboratory in Toronto's Mount Sinai hospital, Tuesday, February 19, 2008. The infectious disease doctor who guided Toronto through the 2003 SARS crisis made an appeal prior to his death for Canada to change the law and legalize assisted suicide.THE CANADIAN PRESS/J.P. Moczulski